The Bowery Boys: New York City History
Since I was a teenager, I’ve had an affinity for writer Langston Hughes, the revolutionary jazz poet who was born 115 years ago today in 1902. I grew up in Springfield, Mo., about an hour away from Langston’s birthplace in Joplin. One of the brightest lights of the Harlem Renaissance grew up here?, I frequently pondered in English class.… Read More
THE FIRST PODCAST The story of how electricity became a tool of death for the state of New York and the strange circumstances behind the invention of the electric chair. The harnessing of electricity by the great inventors of the Gilded Age introduced the world to the miracle of light at all hours of the day.… Read More
The first episode of the Bowery Boys: New York City History podcast came out in the middle of June 2007.  Yes, we’ve been doing this for almost ten years. 220 episodes and going strong! We will be doing some very special things starting this spring in recognition of our tenth year of recording the show. And… Read More
There’s a spiral staircase inside the western half of the Washington Square Arch, which grants access to the rooftop and fabulous views straight up Fifth Avenue. Public entrance is prohibited, of course, although that didn’t stop six fearless malcontents (including the artists Marcel Duchamp and John Sloan) from breaking in to declare a bohemian revolution late… Read More
PODCAST Part One of our two-part series on New York City in the years following the Revolutionary War. The story of New York City’s role in the birth of American government is sometimes forgotten. Most of the buildings important to the first U.S. Congress, which met here from the spring of 1789 to the late… Read More
Civic buildings are often beautiful architecture in plain sight. Their uniformity — many rendered in classical styles — often finds them less appreciated than other forms of urban architecture. In a city like New York, skyscrapers, hotels and brownstones are more likely to get the attention of camera-wielding tourists over courthouses. After all, doesn’t every… Read More
Here’s some old fashioned New York City trivia for you — There’s never been a Speaker of the House from the city of New York, although there have been a couple from New York state –  the otherwise unremarkable John W. Taylor, an upstate New Yorker from the Saratoga region, in 1820-21; and a central New York representative,… Read More
THE FIRST PODCAST  Once upon a time there was a country doctor with a love of birds, a milkmaid with translucent skin, an eight-year-old boy with no idea what he’s in for and a wonderful cow that holds the secret to human immunity. This is the story of the first vaccine, perhaps one of the greatest inventions… Read More
Decades in the making, the Second Avenue Subway finally opened to the public this week, its glimmering new stations at 72nd, 86th, and 96th Streets heralded with the pomp and circumstance of a movie premiere. Of course, the subway doesn’t immediately come to mind as a photogenic movie star, but in fact, the various tunnels and… Read More
Over one hundred years ago, the New York City area (its five boroughs, along with areas in New Jersey and Westchester County) was the undisputed center of the American film industry. The invention of the movie camera and celluloid film processing — revolutionized by Thomas Edison and many others — seamlessly collided with the city’s thriving… Read More
Well, nobody can say that 2016 was an uneventful year. After a rowdy and wild election season, we enter 2017 with New York City poised to take a new — and highly unusual — prominence in American politics. (This episode from 2011 is now officially the weirdest episode in the Bowery Boys back catalog). We… Read More
PODCAST We’re in the mood for a good old-fashioned Gilded Age story so we’re bringing back one of our favorite Bowery Boys episodes ever — Joseph Pulitzer and William Randolph Hearst vs. the newsies! LISTEN TO THIS SHOW HERE: It was pandemonium in the streets. One hot summer in July 1899, thousands of corner newsboys… Read More
Holiday traditions in Manhattan are of course known the world over, from the glowing light displays of Park Avenue to the Rockefeller Center Christmas tree. But they lack a certain human touch, spun from wealthy corporations and honored tradition. Which is what makes Dyker Height’s annual lighting spectacular (festival? competition? freak show?) so fascinating. It’s Brooklyn’s… Read More
According to the Officer Down Memorial Page, there have been 816 New York law enforcement officers who have died in the course of duty. Most of those who have died in the page six years succumbed to 9/11-related illnesses. The last firearm-related death, Paul Tuizzolo, sadly came just a last month, killed in a gunfight in the Bronx.… Read More
PODCAST You may know the story of Alexander Graham Bell and his world famous invention. You may know that Bell made the very first phone call. But do you know the story of the man who ANSWERED that call? His name was Thomas Augustus Watson. He met Bell when he was just 20 years old,… Read More